Ordinances for the Brickstore Overlay will soon be made available to the public after Lloyd Kerr, Director of Development Services, discussed the long-running issue with the board of commissioners Tuesday night.
The Brickstore Overlay project was established around 15 years ago to put ordinances in place in a rural section of the county. Similar overlays are already established in the Salem Road and Almon Road areas. As time passed on the Brickstore project, area residents had concerns with the plan, and three hearings were held in early 2014. Following that, the 2050 Plan drew the ire of some citizens in summer of 2014 and the board of commissioners decided not to move forward at that time with the Brickstore Overlay.
“Since that time we have been sent a redline version of the ordinances that a group of property owners [in the proposed Brickstore Overlay] put together,” Kerr told the Board of Commissioners Tuesday. “They took the model ordinance and added what they felt were appropriate revisions to the ordinance.”
With both the original ordinance and a draft made by property owners in hand, Kerr told the board he feels that an ordinance can be presented for the public to review.
Kerr said an ordinance could be ready for public comment in February, with the required three public hearings to follow.
The overlay went through the public hearing phase, ending in May of 2014 with several residents expressing confusion and concern, causing officials to believe there wouldn’t be a consensus on the project.
“This has been going on for a very long time and we need to have closure on it,” District 3 Commissioner Nancy Schulz said.
The Brick Store Overlay would cover the area surrounding Ga. Hwy. 11 and Hwy. 278 going north past I-20, south past Patrick Road, west to Green Valley Farm and east to Country Walk Road.
Overlays are designed to avoid commercial and residential sprawl by creating walkable, town centers with development ordinances. Some of the guidelines could be sidewalks and paths, clustering businesses together, increasing building density to preserve green space, eliminating large commercial signs on tall poles, requiring certain building materials and requiring commercial buildings to have aesthetically pleasing facades.
“It is time for us to finalize this thing, the east side of the county is uncovered [concerning restricted growth] at the moment,” District 1 Commissioner John Douglas said. “It is important to get this right.”
The board and Kerr agreed to have something ready to present by the BOC’s second meeting in February.
